Democracy And Electoral Process In Nigeria Politics Essay

Democracy And Electoral Process In Nigeria Politics EssayThe kink of decolonisation by and by World War II has led to a number of Third World nations, attempting to g everyplacen themselves through Western-style representative Institutions. well-nigh all of them have failed. thither have been various theories of democratic perceptual constancy and explanations of democratic failure. In general, these theories agree that poor nations, with massive socio economic exploitation needs and high popular expectancy as poorly co-ordinated nations, with deep ethnic divisions and as politically underdeveloped nations, with fragile ships company placement, weak administrative bureaucracies, and little experience with the give-and- prepargon of large exemplification institutions, Third world nations, at their present trains of development, have little realistic hope of sustaining democratic institutions.According to Diamond (1988) the democratic renaissance in Africa has been led by t he continents wealthiest and most populous nation, Nigeria. on that closure was huge expectation after the return of spring to civilian elected presidency in 1979, after thirteen years of array rule. This was to be a all important(p) test of liberal democracy in Africa (Sklar 1982). The system collapsed in little than quadruplet years as a result of massive rot, distraction and electoral rage and fraud. This led to the military coup of 1983.Democracy is delimit as a political system which meets three essential conditions, namely, significant and extensive competition among individuals and political parties a highly inclusive direct of political participation in the selection of leaders and policies and a level of civil and political liberties sufficient to ensure the integrity of political competition and participation. Other concepts related to these are democratic stability, the likelihood of its enduring over prison term, particularly through periods of unusual con flict, strain and crisis. Democratic theorists stress the funny degree to which the stability of democracy depends on a general touch in its legitimacy.Democracy as it is practised in Western nations such as the united States usually involve a thorough demonstrate of contestant selections. This culminates in the primaries within individual parties. In this system, the party campaigner is picked based on the acceptance of the individuals manifesto. There is too party committedness and candidates do not defect to other parties or unionize in all new ones if they do not win the primaries. In such systems, the wide funds raised by each candidate are as well varaned. This system is alike transparent and voters are confident in the system to ensure that the best candidate wins.Democracy and Electoral process in NigeriaAccording to J. Herskovits (1979), Nigeria rejected Britains parliamentary mildew of democracy which they had continued after independence in 1960 and chose th e first wholly Nigerian-made constitution, to follow the American mock up instead. This choice was made with characteristic pragmatism Nigeria, like the United States, is large, complex, and heterogeneous. There was therefore the notion that What works for America may work for Nigeria. Nigerias form of government looks familiar to the American style as the president has a four year term and has a possibility of a game term. The national assembly is bicameral, with a senate and a house of representatives distributed among the supposes by population. There is also the apex judiciary court known as the controlling Court.Nigerias enactment towards democracy has only begun. The re-establishment of an elected government after decades of military rule in 1999 formed that a starting point in a transition process towards a democratic society-a transition that can be expected to take many years. Democratic government in its full sense comprises a wide area of issues a very important one among them is the creation of accountable institutions (Harneit-Sievers 2004). Political parties form another core group of institutions in any functioning democratic system. Under current Nigerian conditions, however, most political parties are merely zero-issue alliances of influential individuals and small groups who are able to control and, often adequate manipulate party structures, candidacies and even the electoral process itself.In Nigeria, a major issue impeding democracy is the selection process of political office holders. This is because so far, the country has been unable to hold relax, fair and conceivable elections. The 2003 elections were billed as a landmark as it was the first time since independence in 1960 that political leadership changed hands from one civilian to another (Herskovits 2007). The election results showed overwhelming victories for the ruling party, PDP as the presidential success received 70 percent of the votes. According to international and domestic observers alike, the elections themselves were portentous with even more(prenominal) rigging and violence than during the previous presidential elections in 1999. The run up to the elections also witnessed the assassination of two gubernatorial a clench runners and violent election related incidents.Based on how expensive tendentious politics is in Nigeria, governments at all levels will rather starve other sector than lave their electoral ambition to suffer musical accompaniment. This is away from the fact that in most places, governance has almost been suspended for designing ahead of the polls. As a result, Nigerians may therefore have to wait till elections are completed to enjoy several social creature comforts promised during the last tenure.The electoral process has also witnessed legal challenges as contestants take election winners to court to contest such results. A memorable human face of this is the Osun State elections which were overruled after thre e and half years. The election result utter that the incumbent governor, Oyinlola won the elections. The resistance took the election result to court. During the investigation process, it was ascertained using biometric machine that several people has voted up to 30 measure each for the incumbent governor. The court therefore asked that this votes be cancelled. This led to the opposition candidate Raufu Aregbesola adequate the governor. As a result of almost four years of uncertainty in the read, local and unlike investors lost dominance in the state. As a result, several companies already operating in the state closed and moved to other states. This led to massive curtailment and increased unemployment in the state. It also caused a reduction in state revenue generated.The electoral process in Nigeria has a negative partake on the country in general. This is because revenue that could be used to cater infrastructure needed by business are used for funding elections. This h as led to continuous borrowing and deficit cipher for year 2011. The keep down budget for the 2011 elections released by INEC was put at N89billion ($659million). In the federal budget for 2011, another N46.4 billion has been allocated to the same elections. Indeed, the total budgetary allocation for elections is nigh N133 billion naira. It is important to state that INECs budget for 2011 dwarfs the budget of most states of the federation. Osun state has budget of N88.1 billion, Kwara state N68.6 billion and Edo has a budget of N106 billion. It is also important to note that this would be funded by government borrowing. When compared to other underdeveloped countries such as Bangladesh, India and Ghana, the cost on per capita basis in Nigeria was more than double. INECs N74 billion on voters register amounts to N1, 138 per capita for 65 million registered voters. Ghana conducted its 2008 elections at the cost of $40million which amounts to $3 per capita.The imbalance caused by flawed elections has led to a threat to foreign investment. As a ontogeny country, Nigeria required foreign investment to survive. The use of large sums of revenue for funding elections rather than developing infrastructure necessary for investment makes the country less desirable to investors. As a result, there is lack of confidence in the country. The political violence and killings have also affected the countrys image abroad. There is also a threat to security as assassination of political aspirants and kidnap of their families is becoming rampant.Recently, the government has taken various measures to ensure free and fair elections in Nigeria. This was affirmed by the sack of former INEC boss, Maurice Iwu who was widely accused of corruption and complacency in electoral result manipulation. The new INEC boss, Jega has committed to ensuring a free and fair election in the country. There has also been the amendment of the electoral law in Nigeria in order to further curb the wid espread election rigging in the country.ConclusionThe issue of political instability has affected the activities of multinational companies in Nigeria the oil companies in the oil well-off delta where kidnap is rampant have been seriously affected. Most multinational companies are currently closing their business and relocating to other countries with more favourable environs and required infrastructure. The level of uncertainty and instability disrupts the profit hunt and causes inability to meet corporate targets. In the political foyer, some groups have been miss which is not a practice of true democracy as power is been controlled by the dominant party with large resources.In order to mortify the problem of election rigging, Nigeria has to be firm in its commitment to providing free and fair election. This goes beyond paying lip service. The INEC also should be accustomed more powers in order to prevent it been manipulated by the government. There is also the increased nee d for foreign observers to train and sensitise INEC officials and also to monitor elections.